American Airlines CRJ700 has mid-air collision with an Army Blackhawk at KDCA

[Jarhead0331]

Visual avoidance has been considered useless in the fact of jets for decades.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. Visual scanning is a key element of collision avoidance, even for jets. As far as I know, see and avoid is one of the primary methods of VFR traffic separation and it is codified in the CFR.

Not if they are approaching each other head-on. You can use it when flying in approximately the same direction.

I do not see any exceptions to the see and avoid rules in the CFR based on head-on approaches. 14 CFR 91.113(b)provides, "[w]hen weather conditions permit, regardless of whether an operation is conducted under instrument flight rules or visual flight rules, vigilance shall be maintained by each person operating an aircraft so as to see and avoid other aircraft. When a rule of this section gives another aircraft the right-of-way, the pilot shall give way to that aircraft and may not pass over, under, or ahead of it unless well clear."

Furthermore, Section (e) specifically addresses visual scanning rules for head-on approaches, stating, "[w]hen aircraft are approaching each other head-on, or nearly so, each pilot of each aircraft shall alter course to the right."

Visual scanning are two responsibilities of every pilot in command always.

[Jarhead0331]

[Toonces]

I simply cannot fault that ATC controller.  Did you see how busy he was?  I think it's fair to assume, when planes are in such proximity, that the helo should have it in sight.  And he identified it as the CRJ (don't know what AA3130 was).  Under the circumstances, I'm not sure how much more info he could reasonably had to provide to the helo.  Not to mention the helo was certainly operating VFR, and so it's assumed their eyes are outside of the cockpit, especially approaching the approach end of a major airport.

No, this one squarely falls on the pilots of the helo.  Very tragic.  I don't know why in the world we're having VFR traffic operating anywhere near that airport given how busy that airspace appears to be.  There have to be more sensible areas for "training" flights.

[Jarhead0331]

I simply cannot fault that ATC controller.  Did you see how busy he was?  I think it's fair to assume, when planes are in such proximity, that the helo should have it in sight.  And he identified it as the CRJ (don't know what AA3130 was).  Under the circumstances, I'm not sure how much more info he could reasonably had to provide to the helo.  Not to mention the helo was certainly operating VFR, and so it's assumed their eyes are outside of the cockpit, especially approaching the approach end of a major airport.

No, this one squarely falls on the pilots of the helo.  Very tragic.  I don't know why in the world we're having VFR traffic operating anywhere near that airport given how busy that airspace appears to be.  There have to be more sensible areas for "training" flights.

I disagree that this is all squarely on the pilot. It is definitely a swiss cheese event. Lots of events and things going wrong at the same time. It is too early to tell what other factors played a role, but I do think that ultimately, ATC will bear some responsibility.

You asked, what else could the ATC have said? For instance, when you have two contacts on your scope heading toward each other, it is the ATC's responsibility to confirm, "PAT25, confirm that you have traffic at left, 11:00 at same altitude..." This is particularly more important given the nature of the airspace being extremely crowded, where it would be very easy to confuse different contacts. That kind of specificity could have possibly prevented this accident.

[Sigwolf]

Most analysis I have seen is corroborating this theory. That when the controller asked PAT25 if he had the traffic in sight and the helo answered in the affirmative, he was most likely not looking at the CRJ. Some have criticized the controller for not being more specific in his inquiry given that the two aircraft where clearly heading toward each other on radar.

Those critical of not being more specific have clearly not listened to the full encounter, or don't understand what they are hearing.  That controller gave an absolute textbook, and excellent traffic call the moment after he cleared JIA5342 to circle to 33 from the initial approach to 1.

He recognized that the maneuver would put the two aircraft in a head-on situation, and as soon as JIA5342 read back the instructions, he immediately issued to first traffic call to PAT25.  In that call he gave the clock position and distance, the JIA's exact present location over a prominent local landmark, his current altitude, the approach he was coming off of, and the fact that he was doing the circle to land 33.  He literally could not have painted a more precise picture of where the conflicting aircraft was, and what he was going to do.  PAT25 immediately responded that he had the traffic in sight, and requested visual separation from the JIA (meaning he was assuming responsibility for separation of the two aircraft).

When it later appeared that PAT25 had not altered course to avoid collision, the controller asked again if he had the traffic in sight, was again given an affirmative reply, and the controller tried to reaffirm the obvious that the helo should turn behind the CRJ.

The pilot of JIA5342 flew a perfectly stabilized approach, and by all indications flew the circle to land procedure accurately and precisely.  The only unexplained, and thus far largely unaddressed factor in this accident comes from PAT25.  All indications this far show that PAT25 was at nearly twice the altitude designated in the charted helicopter corridor (approximately 350' versus the charted 'at or below 200'), and around 1/2 mile off course.  If just one of these (altitude or lateral) was within limits, this would have been a close call at worst, even if he was looking at the wrong aircraft.

None of the recordings to which I have listened thus far have gone back far enough to the initial check-in from PAT25, so I do not know if the lateral and/or altitude deviation from the procedure was addressed or approved ahead of time, but from what I have seen so far, I think that is where the investigation needs to be concentrated.

[Redwolf]

Let's not forget that there is TCAS, an avoidance system, on airliners. It detects collision courses and if appropriate advises both aircraft to go up and down, respectively.

It is a fair guess that the Black Hawk didn't have it, which makes it questionable whether airliners and such helicopters should be mixed in a crowded airspace.

[Sigwolf]

Let's not forget that there is TCAS, an avoidance system, on airliners. It detects collision courses and if appropriate advises both aircraft to go up and down, respectively.

It is a fair guess that the Black Hawk didn't have it, which makes it questionable whether airliners and such helicopters should be mixed in a crowded airspace.

In a situation like this there would be no climb or descent alerts even if it involved two airliners.  Resolution Advisories (RA's) are automatically suppressed below 900' for a variety of reasons (inability of one aircraft to descend due to ground proximity/obstructions, possibility of simultaneous parallel approaches, interference from departing aircraft, etc.)

Even a Traffic Advisory (TA) wouldn't necessarily cause much alarm if the crew knows the traffic in question is maintaining visual separation.  This is especially true if the crew is familiar with KDCA ops, where doing approaches over the helicopter corridor is a very common occurrence.

[Redwolf]

Let's not forget that there is TCAS, an avoidance system, on airliners. It detects collision courses and if appropriate advises both aircraft to go up and down, respectively.

In a situation like this there would be no climb or descent alerts even if it involved two airliners.  Resolution Advisories (RA's) are automatically suppressed below 900' for a variety of reasons (inability of one aircraft to descend due to ground proximity/obstructions, possibility of simultaneous parallel approaches, interference from departing aircraft, etc.)

Right, I forgot about this.

[Con]

I wonder if this is one of those situations where AI is going to start dominating
At least as a backup to rapidly changing days in critical applications such as this
A good AI will be able to follow all the flight paths in congested airspace and alert control if there are deviations from the verbal confirmations that are given due to pilot errors that allow the controllers to move on from following each individual aircraft

[solops]

The first thing I thought when I read that all six people on the jet were Mexican nationals was that it was a cartel hit on someone's family. Somebody messed with the jets avionics hoping to cause a landing crash, perhaps, and the whole air to air collision was a fluke byproduct. Analyses of the flight data will kill this or not pretty easily, along with identifying whether or not the victims were even likely to be targets.

[Redwolf]

The first thing I thought when I read that all six people on the jet were Mexican nationals was that it was a cartel hit on someone's family. Somebody messed with the jets avionics hoping to cause a landing crash, perhaps, and the whole air to air collision was a fluke byproduct. Analyses of the flight data will kill this or not pretty easily, along with identifying whether or not the victims were even likely to be targets.

wat

I think you mix up two crashes here.

[solops]

All six of the people on the medevac jet, Learjet, Philadelphia, were reported to be Mexican nationals, pilot, co-pilot, doctor, paramedic, patient-child and mother, per an article on Fox. So yeah, I may have suffered a juxtaposition with Washington? That does not detract from the beauty of the conspiracy theory, at least until facts catch up.